Olenka smiled, tipping her head like a bashful little girl.

Annie was trying to keep from laughing.

“How is Lew?” Pela asked with concern. “How our grandson?”

“Good,” Annie said.

“Tell him come visit. His mama, we have picture. We show him.”

Annie nodded. This made her a little sad.

The tea was cold and milky, the assortment of cookies utterly stale—the same plate of cookies they had kept at the ready for years.

After just a couple of minutes, Pela said, “We need show this boy something.” Snatching his hand up, Pela led him out. Annie followed with Olenka as Pela pulled Raj through the crowded and filthy kitchen, in which the two old women essentially lived, into the garden. In a pile, just a few yards from the back door, were dozens of granite rocks, the smallest the size of a bowling ball.

Pela took him right up to the pile, still holding his hand. Olenka hurried to secure his other.

“You see,” Pela explained, “rocks here from old wall. Man he going throw them. We want rocks out at pond.” She pointed toward the back of the long garden.

“Has you seen our horse?” Olenka said.

“I saw it. Beautiful horse,” Raj replied.

“So how you think”—Pela stared intensely at Raj—“we get rocks from here to pond?”

“Well…” Raj said.

“Sashenka!” Annie pointed through the open back door. “He was going toward the parlor.”

With a Russian curse, Pela hurried back into the house. Olenka, who looked like a child at a maypole, kept hold of Raj.

“I got to take him now.” Annie gently pried him from Olenka’s grip.

“A run before he feeds?” Olenka said.

“Quick.” Annie tugged Raj’s shirt. They sprinted the length of the garden and out through the gate.

When they got back onto the road, she said, “Now I’m glad Lew wasn’t with us.”

“They’re his grandparents?”

“Kind of, I guess. Lew’s mom came on one of the orphan trains. The sisters adopted her.”

“Orphan trains?”

“Trains full of orphans from New York, because of the influenza and stuff like that. They’d just stop at towns and people would adopt one.”

“Why doesn’t Lew want to see them?”

“They were mean to his mom. Used to be three sisters. The one who died was the meanest. They’re refugees from Russia. They were rich over there.”

“So how they end up in Pisgah?”

“Used to live in KC with their brother, but they got scared of the city, so he bought them this house out here. Every time you go near them, they want you to do something. Sucked in pretty much everyone in town, one time or another. Can’t stop thinking of people as servants.”

“Why don’t they hire someone?”